Northwest Florida State College has released the findings of a five-month internal review that determined live medications, including controlled substances, were stored in the building housing the college’s nursing program without proper oversight or disposal procedures.

• The college said it acted promptly after receiving the complaint, completing interviews with all full-time nursing faculty and staff, securing the materials, and engaging a licensed vendor to dispose of 172 pounds of regulated medical waste. The nursing director resigned in January 2026, and the dean of health sciences retired on a pre-planned timeline the same month.

“The College determined that the program stored real medications in its facility without a basis for having those materials in an educational setting and lacked procedures for oversight and disposal,” the college said in a statement.

The college’s findings were detailed in a 15-page report dated April 1, addressed to President Mel Ponder from the college’s senior vice president for human resources, vice president of academic affairs, executive director of human resources and dean of workforce education.

The complaint

According to the report, a nursing faculty member submitted a complaint to President Ponder on Oct. 31, 2025, alleging that live medications were improperly stored in the School of Nursing and that program leadership had failed to act. The president referred the matter to human resources the following business day, and the review began immediately.

The college defined “live medication” for the purpose of its review as any real medication of any kind — prescription, controlled or otherwise, in-date or expired — that was not clearly marked as a simulation dose.

What the review found

The review validated the faculty member’s central allegation. The college identified more than 100 different kinds of live medication based on the labels on the containers, with many duplicates, according to the report.

Among the materials found were at least seven controlled substances, including morphine sulfate, fentanyl, hydromorphone, midazolam, lorazepam and diazepam, across more than 20 containers. The report also documented paralytics, sedatives, cardiac medications, anticoagulants, vaccines, opioid-overdose medications, blood thinners and dozens of other prescription drugs. Many had been expired for years, with some expiration dates reaching back to the 1990s, according to inventory records.

The containers were found scattered throughout the nursing building in closets and storage areas accessible to students, faculty and staff, according to the report. None were marked as simulation doses.

The report states the college does not hold a Drug Enforcement Administration registration or a Florida Department of Business and Professional Regulation authorization for possessing prescription or controlled substances in the School of Nursing.

• “The School of Nursing did not and does not have a clinic or other purpose for holding live medications,” the report states.

Program leadership’s knowledge and response

The report found sufficient evidence that the nursing director and the dean of health sciences were allegedly aware of at least one container of live medication in the building as of July 2025. Text messages from July 16, 2025, reportedly show the two exchanged messages regarding a container of succinylcholine found in the building, according to the report. The material was disposed of without inventory or record of how it was disposed of, and no further action was taken to determine whether additional live medications were present.

The nursing program had no established protocol for live medications because none were supposed to be in the building, according to the report. Both the nursing director and the dean acknowledged this in their interviews.

By summer 2025, at least three faculty members had reportedly raised concerns about live medications to the nursing director and received no written procedures for disposal, the report states. The absence of direction resulted in at least two faculty members using their own judgment to dispose of materials.

In one instance, two faculty members located a vial of rocuronium — another paralytic — on Nov. 3, 2025, and delivered it to the NWFSC Police Department on their own because no procedures existed within the nursing program, according to the report.

The college’s response

On Nov. 10, 2025 — within days of receiving the complaint — the college notified the nursing director and the dean that a review was underway. That same day, human resources and academic affairs representatives visited the nursing building with a campus police officer and secured the materials they found in a locked storage room.

On Nov. 19, the college brought in EMS coordinators to conduct a full review of all closets and storage locations in the building without notice to the nursing program. The coordinators identified and removed all live medications found at that time to a secure facility on the Niceville campus.

By Nov. 25, the college had interviewed all full-time nursing faculty. The college placed the nursing director and the dean on administrative leave on Nov. 24.

Disposal directed after review began

Despite her knowledge of the active review, the nursing director on Nov. 17 reportedly responded to a faculty member’s email asking for disposal guidance by telling the faculty member to dispose of medications however they were most comfortable, according to the report. The response did not include direction to document or identify the materials, and the nursing director did not notify human resources of the email.

• The following day, the nursing director removed additional materials from the building and brought them to the campus police department without notifying the review team, according to the report. Human resources learned of it only because a staff member witnessed the exchange.

The report characterized the nursing director’s actions as showing “a lack of knowledge of proper disposal procedures, lack of forthright disclosure during an active review, and promoting an individual-action response without any written procedures in place.”

External reporting and personnel changes

On Nov. 18, 2025, the complainant notified college leadership and external federal, state and accreditation authorities that they had reported the matter outside the college, alleging they had been instructed to interfere with evidence relevant to the review, according to the report.

The nursing director resigned on Jan. 12, 2026. The dean continued on administrative leave until her pre-planned retirement date of Jan. 30, 2026.

Corrective actions

On March 2, 2026, the college completed disposal of all collected materials through a contracted medical waste vendor. The college has implemented a zero-tolerance policy for live medication in the nursing building, published a donation policy prohibiting live medication and established a reporting form for any future findings.

The college said there were no reports of injuries or incidents involving students or staff.

The college noted it will celebrate more than 50 nursing graduates in May and said the nursing program saw 10 percent enrollment growth from the spring to fall semesters. The college said it retains strong NCLEX pass rates that consistently exceed national and state averages. A new dean for all health sciences programs is expected to start in mid-May.

• “The College remains fully committed to maintaining the highest standards of safety, compliance, and educational excellence as it continues to serve students and the community,” the statement reads.

The report also addressed secondary allegations from the complainant regarding unprofessional conduct, grade grievances and other workplace concerns. The college did not validate those allegations, finding no corroborating evidence.